Skylar and Jarrod on MultiCultural Day

SKYLAR AND JARROD ON MULTI CULTURAL DAY




Skylar and Jarrod went to grade school at University Elementary in Irvine, not too far from UC Irvine.  Because of the location their school was full of children from many different cultures, Persian, Pakistani, Japanese, Romanian and many more.  Every year their school would have a Multi Cultural Day when kids would wear clothes (or costumes) from their respective countries or cultures.  Sky and Jarrod felt left out.  Though Jack and I are mostly Anglo European we are also each part Eastern European.

Neither of us have much from our Slavic or Serbian cultures except a few words and of course foods.  But I wasn't going to have my kids left out so I made them these costumes.  This was pre internet pretty much so all I had were reference books.  I couldn't find anything specifically Slavic or Serbian but I did find Polish, Hungarian, etc. and decided to put together the best I could.  It is not too easy to tell in these pictures but Sky has on a basic shift with two aprons, one in front and one in back.  Her necklace is made of bright glass beads and new dimes.  Jack used a drill and put holes in the dimes so I could string them.  The necklace was surprisingly heavy.  Jarrod's hat is made from faux fur and is folded over to the side with a tassel.  He has red ribbons attached to his shoes and wound up around his pant legs representing leggings.  Maybe it is not apparent to everyone but I can tell from their faces that they were very proud to wear these.

Because I was working in the Humanities School at UCI I wanted to show the kids off to some of my friends in the departments, especially the German Department.  I had grown up with the understanding that my father's family name was German.  He had recently retired and was doing genealogy and found that his ancestor was actually from Alsace.  Alsace has been part of both France and Germany over the years so it has parts of both cultures.  When I ran into one of the faculty from the French Department he said I could have made them French costumes!  I believe they were in the Fourth Grade here which would make it about 1997 or 98.